CHAPTER 25.

As soon as I opened my eyes, blinding pain flashed through my skull, and I felt my essence levels dip sharply as my implant began to apply our new found insight to repairing my body.

As my bones were forced back into shape, pain burned through me, making me want to scream. I expected my implant to set countermeasures to mitigate the pain, but for some reason my request for pain management was denied.

I wonder how long I'd been unconscious and how much time the ladies had before they were raped and butchered.

As much as I would like to immediately rush to the rescue, my body was in no shape to take on half-orc, vampires and demons.

Accepting the fact that I was stuck here until my body ise. sufficiently repaired.

I closed my eyes and began to cultivate while my body knit itself. The smooth flow of essence within and around acted like a balm that countered some of the pain.

My implant made me aware of a backlog of notifications that I had ignored since I first forged my core.

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Core formation success

Resonant Core (Seed)

Core Layers: Omni-Layered

Nodes: None (Additional data required)

Core unique properties:

Amorphous: Resonant Core unique properties allows the core to alter it's structure based on the host's need and knowledge. Further data is required to fully explore this ability.

Improved essence refinement: vibrations allow for improved filtering of essence. 60% of all essence absorbed is converted into highly refined essence without cultivation.

Improved essence density: Resonant Core properties manipulate essence at a minute level, allowing for compression levels beyond standard cultivation limits. Essence density is passively manipulated to two levels above host’s cultivation

Improved Mental resistance and strength: All mental based attributes have been improved by 250%, except for perception which has been improved by 400%. Core absorbs and negates half the pressure from an essence based mental attack. Resonant Core can alter its structure to best defend against an incoming mental attack. There is a 5% chance to totally negate an essence based mental attack.

Improved Mental awareness: Core's location and design provides heightened perception and awareness by an additional 50% during adrenaline fueled situations. Resonant Core quantum structure allows for a manipulation of higher tiered mental effect: Time. 5% chance of limited spatial and temporal dilation under adrenaline fueled conditions.

Improved physical resistance and strength: Core increases both constitution and strength by 200%. Core absorbs and negates half of all directed attacks. Resonant core's multi dimensional properties allow for unique energy manipulation. 5% chance to totally negate an essence based attack.

Improved strain absorption: Core design improves essence strain absorption negating 50% of strain from all essence effects and techniques.

Improved technique conservation: Core design allows for reduced essence loss during technique or spell activation. Essence loss for available techniques has been reduced by 80%. Reduces effect’s conjuring time by 40%, and cuts effect’s t time cost by 50% at the price of a 10% increase in strain.

Improved core capacity: Resonant core's quantum properties allow for near limitless essence storage capacity. Core requires ever increasing density of refined essence for its continued development. Sourcing for high density essence sources is advised.

Entropy Effect: Due to the alien and unknown properties of the core. There is the possibility of unknown and exotic effects with equally unknown properties. The chance of these effects will rise as the core advances. Chance of unexpected and uncontrollable effects may occur in times of stress.

Core function discovered.

Improved essence control and manipulation: core design allows for improved control and manipulation of essence that is limited to the host's ability or will. Further analysis of core structure has revealed that essence density and identity is tangentially tied to level of essence control and manipulation.

Essence perception: Grants the ability to breakdown and perfectly perceive andany essence based effect. Generates a permanent field that can discern any magical effect. Can be used with passive implant analysis to improve perception.

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It seems my new core was worth the pain, suffering and risk to life and limb that forging it had cost me. Its benefits surpassed all my expectations.

Though the core's design cost far too much essence, it more than made up for it in unique attributes and functions. I was also concerned regarding the entropic nature of my new core. Having a core that I could not fully control and with unknown abilities did not completely sit well with me, I already had enough issues dealing with a piece of tech in my head that I did not really understand and a soul that seemed to have its own opinions and was not afraid to make itself heard.

This core was way too overpowered. I barely understood most of its abilities even at its current level, making me wonder what benefits it would provide as higher levels of cultivation.

That last core function was the most surprising and as far as I was concerned, the most important.

This core function allowed me access to an essence of higher density or identity above and beyond my rank. It basically meant that I could fold, bend and compress essence within my core as long as I'm able to control and manipulate it.

But I guessed that core’s unique features would not allow me to gain higher density essence via essence manipulation, above my stage, at least not in its seed form.

Satisfied with my gains, I turned my thoughts to other problems that had been plaguing me since I created my first technique.

Despite all the information I had acquired regarding essence, I had yet to encounter a uniform metric for this strange energy.

Without this metric, I would be unable to determine the essence cost of any technique, spell, ability or effect I came across.

The flexible nature of essence made it difficult to assign a uniform standard of measurement. The locals made general approximations based on level of cultivation.

After much thought, I decided on a simple metric.

I assigned a value of one essence point as the standard energy potential of a peak human and since those at the peak of the absorption stage have the potential energy of seven peak humans, the total essence value of their cultivation is seven energy points.

If the average cultivator at the peak of the absorption stage uses a technique that consumes one energy point, this means that all things being equal, they will be using approximately one seventh of their total cultivation to activate the technique.

Having a core allows me to recycle essence from my techniques, with a loss of twenty percent, if I can figure out how to perfect a single technique.

Though it was not much of a problem yet as my greedy core tended to absorb any refined essence not tied to an effect or under my direct control.

Another aspect of my cultivation that was lacking a uniform metric, was my level of strain.

From what I understood, the human body was not actually designed as a container for pure energy. Essence could be toxic to the body but only to a certain degree.

Strain was the damage that accrued within my body when I used my body to channel more essence than my cultivation would allow. I don't know how deep this damage goes.

It may be only physical, or it may be causing damage to my core and cultivation, it might even be causing damage to my soul.

But I needed a better metric, other than blinding pain and possible internal damage.

But I had little or no information on strain and how it affected me, so I settled for a notification from my implant each time I reached a certain strain level.

I decided on a simple color coded warning system.

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Green: Essence toxicity is completely negated by current cultivation and natural resistance.

Yellow: Essence toxicity has begun to overwhelm the body's natural resistance and pressure is being placed on the core. The body is wracked with pain and fatigue and minor internal damage begins to accrue with the body

Red: Essence toxicity has overwhelmed the body's natural resistance and cultivation core. The body now incurs major damage with additional essence use.

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I now had a way to keep track of my strain levels, although the pain of essence toxicity should be a sufficient reminder of my limits, the indicator appealed to my sense of order.

Most of my back had already been fused together, but there was still a lot of healing to be done on other parts of my body.

I continued to scan my notifications.

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Technique upgrade.

Seismic-sense (sensory): Technique vibrates earth essence at modulated ultrasonic frequencies to generate an internal map of most vibrations sources connected to the earth, creating a rough 3D map of the earth around you. Increase in cultivation will improve the detail level, sensitivity and range of the technique. Implant support will greatly enhance the technique’s effectiveness.

Type: Active technique (AOE)

Essence composition: Earth

Range: 150 meters (Detail level drops with distance)

Activation Cost: 0.1 essence point (0.2 points extra for every hour the technique is in effect. Channeling may improve the effectiveness of this technique.)

Technique upgrade.

Ultrasonic cutting technique (Offensive Enhancement): Layer any edge with earth essence and oscillate at ultrasonic frequencies to create an extremely sharp cutting edge. Cutting edge has a stronger identity and can now be projected several meters away from the material.

Type: Offense technique

Essence composition: Earth

Range: 1m (damage drops with distance)

Activation Cost: 0.2 essence points, 0.4 essence points to project technique (0.2 points for every hour the technique is in effect.) Channeling may improve the effectiveness of this technique.

Technique upgrade.

Earth Pulse Technique (Directed): Layer any earth based surface with high vibration earth essence. Full range of effects requires further analysis.

Type: Multi purpose

Essence composition: Earth

Range: 15m

Activation: Varied

Mind Firewall (Mental).

Mind firewall is based on implant architecture and resonant core design. Allows host to permanently resist mental attacks created using essence of a lower density to host’s cultivation rank.

Type: Ability (Passive)

Essence composition: Refined

Range: None

Activation Cost: 7 essence points are permanently assigned to the ability. Channeling may improve the effect.

Additional Effect 1: Mental resistance.

100% chance to resist low level localized essence based mental attacks (attacks forged from essence below cultivator’s maximum density level)

50% chance to resist mid-level localized essence based mental attacks (attacks forged from essence four ranks above cultivator’s maximum density level)

20% chance to resist high level localized essence based mental attacks (attacks forged from essence one stage above cultivator’s maximum density level)

100% chance to resist low level directed essence based mental attacks

30% chance to resist mid-level directed essence based mental attacks

5% chance to resist high level directed essence based mental attacks

Effect 2: Improved Reflex, Dexterity, Agility and Perception.

Reinforced neural pathways due to implant architecture and core design have led to a permanent improvement in reflex, dexterity, agility and perception attributes by 50%.

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Wow so many benefits, especially from my new core, and it wasn't even fully developed, I thought in amazement, wondering what would happen when my core was fully formed.

So many possibilities.

My new mental firewall, setup by my implant, would provide a very OP level of protection against mental attacks, it even allowed me to partially resist the effects of the collar.

As I thought of finding Astrel and finishing what I started, a red haze filled my vision. For my peace of mind, I really need to kill that bitch.

Doing my best to ignore the burning pains flashing through me as my body forcefully snapped back into place, I continued to look through my notifications.

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New insight acquired.

Body Optimization (Physical).

Type: Ability (Implant imbued, Passive)

Essence composition: Refined

Range: None

Essence Cost: Variable

Effect 1: Rapid and complete repair and regeneration of the body from any damage or attack using highly refined essence, targeted cellular infusion and advanced medical data.

Effect 2: Immunity to most poison and toxins.

Passive effect acquired.

Effect3: Damaged body infusion.

Through direct cell infusion and alteration, host biomolecular structure can be rapidly restored, even under extreme physical duress. Permanent changes to host biology have also been detected during the alteration process and can be exploited to further optimize and accelerate host's genetic and molecular potential. While directed evolution is still under review, limited physical optimization is currently achievable under constant and extreme physical stress. Each time rapid regeneration takes effect, the body is altered and infused relative to the amount of damage incurred. Skin Muscles, bones, organs and cells, become stronger and more conductive to essence during regeneration. The more damage a particular part of the body takes the greater the level of infusion.

Recommendation.

Intentional damage can be carried out on various parts of the body on a micro level to ensure constant and even body infusion. This effect will consume a relatively small measure of will and requires a constant infusion of essence. All active cultivation gains will be absorbed by this effect and may limit cultivation advancement.

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This thing in my head is sick, wasn't I in enough pain already?

Why would I decide to willingly harm myself to gain some measure of strength?

After raging silently in impotent and shallow indignation, I was forced to remember that the implant had no agency of its own and took direction from my awakened soul.

Meaning some part of me was clearly interested in the idea. Hell you can even say that a part of me came up with the idea. The possibility of growing stronger the harder I was hit appealed to me, at least as long as I survived the initial beating. But I was wary of gaining more data following this line of inquiry

The advice of the powerful entity has coincidentally given me access to a powerful body infusion technique. I no longer needed to wait until I was at the peak of the compression stage or rely on the questionable concept of body meridians to enhance my body.

Was he aware of this hidden benefit when he informed me of the ability? I was forced to wonder at the motives of this being and what he may request in return for all his help.

It took a bit longer for my body to be repaired, but I had lost a lot of blood during the attack and also some of my mass as my implant cannibalized materials from other parts of my body to minimize essence cost.

I spent more time cultivating the earth essence within my cell and recovering what a bit of the will I lost during the regeneration process. I still had no way of measuring will and my implant was for some reason, unable to provide more information on the attribute.

After a few hours, my body was completely healed, although I was slightly slimmer after the healing process.

I stood up and flexed my newly repaired body.

My body was slightly stronger than before, especially my back and chest area where I took the most damage. I also felt I could endure a bit more strain from using essence.

I sent a query to my implant to pull up my updated profile.

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Biometric Profile.

Name: William Izu

Race: Human

Age: 24

Height: 6 feet 8 inches

Weight: 302 pounds

Cultivation Rank: Core formation Stage (Rank G)

Core Type: Anomalous (Seed level)

Essence Affinity.

Earth (25%)

Fell (1%)

Dark (0.1%)

Unknown essence types combined total (0.01%)

Qi identity: Conscious (Primal)

Essence density:

Base density: Air,

Maximum Density: Wood

Attributes.

Strength: 450

Dexterity: 370

Agility: 350

Perception: 500 +(250)

Reflex: 350

Resistance: 150 (+900)

Regeneration: 200 (+2,000)

Constitution: 250

Intelligence: ?

Charisma: ?

Skills.

Utility

Improvisation

Combat.

Hand to hand Combat (Basic)

Melee weapon proficiency: Sword (Basic)

Melee weapon proficiency: Knife (Basic)

Melee weapon proficiency: Pickaxe (Basic)

Professions.

Mechanic

Engineer(Computer, Electrical)

Programmer (game developer)

Essence Techniques.

Seismic-sense

Ultrasonic cutting technique

Earth pulse technique

Cultivation Technique.

Vibration refinement technique

Abilities.

Passive Abilities.

Mind Firewall

Body Optimization

Mission.

Escape Blòtvarda

Gain Power

Objectives

Get rid of slave collar

Learn more about cultivation

Find the other enslaved humans

Protect Zalla.

Learn more about the Realm Killer

Get the f**k out of Zomyr

Optional Objectives

Kill Avery

Kill Ivelina

Kill Astrel (slowly and painfully)

Kill Tinuviel

Destroy blòtvarda

Save Suu, Melody and Minnie.

Inventory.

1 Woven shirt (Poor Quality)

1 Woven Trousers (Poor Quality)

Currency.

Points: Undetermined

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"Break time's over, time to blow this joint."

I reached out to my soul via my implant and stretched out my hand to use my new offensive ability, but to my disappointment, nothing happened.

I spent the next hour trying to figure out what I was doing wrong when the answer came to me.

Even though I had the potential to perform the technique, I lacked the power, insight and strength of the powerful entity that gifted me the technique.

If I was going to successfully perform the technique, I would have to manage my expectations.

After a few minutes of thinking and intense pondering, I finally decided on what to do

Taking a knee, I placed my flattened palm on the ground, trying to feel the energy within the rocks under my feet, trying to push my senses into the ground beneath me. My seismic-sense made the job, and I was once again compelled to be suspicious of the seemingly perfect symmetry amongst my abilities. Almost as if it was all part of someone else's plan. Soon I began to feel the pulsing energy trapped within the ground.

Using earth essence, I directed my earth pulse technique; yet another seemingly symmetrical technique through my hand slowly raising the frequency of my pulse and causing a build up of seismic energy within the ground.

Soon the cell and the surrounding space began to shake and I immediately tried to absorb the released kinetic energy.

I felt a powerful pressure on my body and blood spurted from my mouth due to strain on my body. My knees buckled and I fell to my knees, the overwhelming pressure pressing me towards the earth.

Motherfucker made the ability look easy, he didn't say anything about what would happen when I drew all that raw kinetic energy directly into my body. More blood spurted from my mouth as my bones and organs were flattened under the crushing pressure and my implant struggled to fix the damage.

Gritting my teeth, I struggled to ignore the pain. Slowly, I raised my head from my kneeling position and I quickly focused all the kinetic energy at the bars.

The force of all that kinetic energy moving rapidly through me pushed me back towards the wall behind me.

I slammed into the wall like a wrecking ball, and even with my more than doubled stats, my ribs groaned in protest.

The bars and the walls surrounding it gave way to the overwhelming force.

My mouth hung open like a fish out of water as my mind tried to process the power of my new technique.

I immediately received a notification with information about my new ability.

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Specialization discovered: Geokinetics.

This earth based specialization applies higher tiered effects to earth essence and allows for the transfer and manipulation of energy within the earth. Kinetic, geothermal, seismic and electromagnetic energy amongst other forces can be potentially absorbed and directed from the earth to be shaped into desired effects.

New Technique Discovered.

Kinetic blast.

Specialization: Geokinetics

Type: offensive technique (Ranged)

Essence composition: Earth

Range: 12m

Essence cost: 4 energy points ( - 3.6 EP)

Essence Strain: Minimal

Casting time: 25 seconds (-11 Seconds)

Recommended Cool Down Time: 3 minutes

Effect: generate and absorb kinetic energy from the earth and then direct it at your target as an overwhelming crushing force. Essence can be channeled to enhance the effect but at the cost of increased strain

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As my only ranged attack, kinetic blast was way too overpowered. Then there was the bonus of a new specialization, which I had no idea was a thing. With potential access to all the physical forces tied to the earth, I could see my power as a cultivator regardless of my single affinity for earth growing rapidly, and while I was happy with my most recent boons, I couldn’t for the life of me shake the looming idea of painfully heavy bills coming due.

Even with my personal physics knowledge and the all encompassing knowledge from my implant, the technique cost a whopping four energy points, and that was not even taking into account the level of concentration, physica, mental and essence strain necessary to perform the technique at my current level. Although I noticed that half of the cost of the technique went to fixing the damage done by using it. This was my first technique with a recommended cool down time; reflecting not only on the power of the technique, but also on the stress it placed on my body. The set cool down time of three minutes was clearly a suggestion, seeing as I was not in a video game or a world with game-like mechanics like in some of my favourite fantasy. But I had to assume that there were valid reasons for the number. Well, I’ll find out what happens when I ignore the cool down time trying to insta cast such a cool technique.

I stepped out of the cell or at least what was left of it and crouched, drawing more kinetic energy using my earth pulsing technique and seismic sense, in anticipation of the maul wielding half-orcs.

Thanks to my strange dream, I basically had a cheat sheet on all their moves. Without fail I was assaulted by half-orcs wielding weapons similar to the ones in my dream. But instead of two half-orcs, I was attacked by three. Clearly there were some differences between my weird dream and reality. But I had already drawn enough force to make my bones creak audibly and blood leak from my mouth and ears.

Stretching forth both my hands, I released a directed burst of force directed at the half-orc at the center. Air was pushed away from me as the force slammed into the half-orc center mass, and he promptly exploded in a wash of blood and gore. But the secondary effect of the technique was even more devastating.

The range of the technique is twelve metres feet for a reason. At that range, my control over the technique fell apart and all that compressed energy exploded in every direction. The same result also occurred when the technique hit a solid object like an extremely dense half-orc. The technique fell apart, sending all that compressed force in every direction and blasting the two other half-orcs, ripping them apart. The force of the back lash reached me slamming me into the wall behind and forcing a spurt of blood from my mouth. As I slumped to the ground, my Implant was rapidly fixing the damage done to my body, while my strange core was absorbing all the essence released at the death of the three orcs. Most of it was greedily absorbed, but to my surprise, a little more than what it usually left for me; which is nothing was available within my core. Soul or core hijink? I ceased caring glad to have a little bit in the tank for my new offensive technique.

I came across two more patrols, each one larger than the last, and I applied my new technique with great effect, the only fear in my mind being that of a cave due to all the massive explosions. This time, I timed the release of the technique so that I exploded a meter before my enemies got in range. Sure it limited its potential as a directed attack but the massive secondary AOE more than made up for it. I was weary of getting within range of that powerful backlash, especially because for some reason I had yet to figure out, the technique was growing slightly more powerful with each use. Imagine getting killed by your own move. I always hated when that happened to me in games.

But by my third kinetic blast, I noticed that the technique's cost greatly increased and the strain on my mind and body skyrocketed as more and more pressure from the technique damaged my body and my implant worked over time to fix the damage. I was now beginning to get an idea of what happens when the recommended cool down time was ignored.

My core in response to the situation, had to stop it's gluttonous pull on my passive essence draw to compensate for my ever increasing physical and strain damage, while my implant manipulated my brain chemistry to counter the pain caused by strain trying to overwhelm me. While the pain was dulled, for some reason, my implant was unable to totally negate it.

Clearly this technique was way above my level and abusing it the way I did was going to get me killed.

More and more enemies began to flood the passageways and my body began to way, my vision dimming from essence strain and blood loss.

My body felt like it was falling apart with every step I took and my control over the technique began to fail even with the aid of my implant. Although I had sufficient essence from my passive draw, my potential was constrained by the limitations of my body.

I rested on the nearest wall, too tired to continue and doing my very best not to lose consciousness. I had to keep my thoughts of the ladies in my mind, especially Suu. I was at a four-way passage and massive half-orcs were coming from three of the passageways. Two particularly massive half-orcs with large spiked mauls were leading the charge coming from my left, while two with massive scimitars led the charge approaching from the right.

From the passageway ahead of me, one massive half-orc carried a large metal net and the other a heavy looking spear, leading a group of slightly smaller half-orcs towards me.

I was totally fucked, all they needed to do was get that net over me and then round up on me with those heavy weapons.

I tried to excite the earth to generate the necessary kinetic energy but the sharp pain that slashed through my brain disrupted my concentration. I had enough essence but my body was already overtaxed and without my input, my implant couldn't perform the technique.

The half-orcs got closer, probably sensing that exhaustion and using the opportunity to go in for the kill.

I felt so tired, like I'd lost the will to continue.

In the dimming haze of near unconsciousness, a thought struck me. Wait a minute, that's the problem, I was losing a measure of will due to my body repair technique.

But the major drain on my will was my new geokinetic ability. The powerful entity warned me that my reliance on my implant would cost me will.

Like my seismic-sense and my cutting technique, I needed to be able to execute all my techniques on my own with my implant playing a guiding and supporting role in my cultivation.

I closed my eyes, taking deep breaths, trying to center myself. How do I put everything that I am into a technique and what does that even mean?

I slumped towards the ground, my left palm spread flat on the ground and then I began to generate high frequency vibrations and direct them into the ground.

The entire passageway began to shake with increasing intensity and this gave the half-orcs coming at me pause as they tried to figure out how this new occurrence fit into their plans of capturing me.

But I ignored them, ignored my implant, I even ignored my awakened soul. Through my flickering seismic sense, I could feel the earth around me, the half-orcs with their metal rich weapons, the insects skittering all around me and finally, the wonderful feeling of the earth as it shifted and settled all around me.

What did I have to give my technique, what was left of me after people like Avery who look at me like I'm less than nothing, had taken their piece.

What's left after being hollowed out by an indifferent world, my hopes and dreams crushed under the machinations of an unfair system?

What's left after all my naive ideas of making an honest living were quashed by the realities of being amongst the poor educated minority in modern America?

What's left after incarceration, when you become nothing more than a statistic, knowing that your every action from this moment forward will be colored by this relatively short phase of your life.

What's left without my parents; the only other people in this world that I'd ever had a meaningful connection to.For a long time, I tried not to think about them, pushing the pain of their sudden death, moving from foster home to foster home.

All that's left is rage and hate, a fuckton of hate.

All that's left is a deep seething need to break everything in retaliation, to tell the world that wants to me keep me down that'd I'd bring it all fucking down before that happened.

The pain I'd been holding in for so long under a facade of bravado and indifference had to be let out.

So I let it out with a loud roar.

Even though this new pain was not physical in nature, I screamed in agony and I felt my anguish like molten lava enter my technique and amplify it.

I was so lost in my rage, my anger, that I did not notice the alerts from my implant, warning me of geological instability and a possible seismic event.

Through my seismic-sense, I could see the half-orcs trying to find their footing as the entire space became unstable, the earth trying to buck them like a cowboy on a rodeo bull.

Large chunks of rocks began to fall across the cavern and more half-orc guards, vampires and some demons rushed in to quell the disruptive force that I represented.

Some night clerics also joined them with wands in their hands, preparing to strike me down at the first opportunity.

I was still screaming, for myself, for the little boy that lost his parents too early to greed and avarice, for Siobhan and innocent Ainsling, for the three women that needed my help.

"I'm going to level this shithole," I screamed through gritted teeth.

Suddenly, the tremors subsided and the relief on some of the half-orcs' brutish faces was palpable. They watched me for a bit before continuing in my direction, confident that I had expended myself.

While the half-orcs guards were wary of approaching me, the vampire's and demons had no problem rushing towards me with preternatural speed.

As soon as the first vampire got within a feet of my prostrating form, I released my hold on the technique.

The tremors did not subside because I ran out of steam.

No, tremors subsided because most of that recently generated kinetic energy had been transferred directly into my body.

The strain on my organs was enormous and I could feel cracks spread across my bones, some of my organs ruptured and blood vessels burst all over my body.

Releasing all that force felt cathartic, like letting go, leaving behind everything that held me down in the past.

By the time I opened my eyes, I had used up most of my absorbed essence and I was leaking blood from my eyes, ears and nose.

But the carnage that greeted me made me wretch my empty stomach in horror.

I was inside a small crater, like the center of a bomb blast and pieces of bodies lay scattered around me.

So many bodies, some were so mangled that they were unidentifiable.

A few of the demons and vampires were still alive but in no condition to attack as all of them were missing several limbs and groaning in agony.

There was so much calm within me, like I'd let go of something heavy I did not know I was carrying. I felt so light, so free. I slumped to the ground, my body unable to move while my implant used essence from my passive draw to heal me.

I knew I was never going back to Earth. Because even if I found a way back, the “me” that left would not be the one that returned.

I really should have done this a long time ago.

After a few minutes, most of the major internal damage had been stabilized. I ignored the messages from my implant to rest and avoid further combat, confident that the rest of the damage would be taken care of on the go. I stood up and walked to the mangled corpse of a half-orc. I picked up his scimitar and it began to vibrate with a flickering but intense ultrasonic cutting force.

When those left alive heard the hum, they began to struggle to escape, to fight back.

Some managed to give commands, ordering me to stop, to resist all acts of violence.

But the attacks of my collar regardless of their intensity were ignored. It tried locking me in place like before, but my new body repair function easily countered the effect.

Pain was negated by my mental blocks and even the physical pain projected by the collar felt like a love tap compared to the rage filled me.

I moved steadily, unconcerned by the panic and fear of the survivors.

One by one, I went full Darth Vader on their ass, dismembering all the helpless monsters.

Surrounded by the carnage and covered from head to toe in blood and dirt, I began to cultivate.

Using my fledgling seismic-sense, I kept a constant watch to ensure I was undisturbed.

I expected to leave most of the free essence behind and continued on my way.

But to my surprise, I absorbed all the free essence; including the ones from my now dead enemies was swiftly absorbed in less than10 minutes.

With my essence-sense, I felt all the essence in the cavern slam into me at blinding speeds.

I barely felt it as the essence-density of the essence I was cultivating was far lower than the density within my own core.

My core was designed to manipulate essence, both to purify it and increase its essence density the longer I cultivated. I had a suspicion that the essence levels within my current location were too low for my current cultivation ability and my resonant core.

Standing up, and picking up a new scimitar from among the bodies, I continued down the passageway leading to the audience chamber.

My implant sent several notifications, but I ignored them in favor of expediency.

I encountered more half-orcs and a few low level vampires and demons. But this time, choosing to conserve energy due to the massive costs of my geokinetic techniques, both in essence and strain.

I pulled out my new blade and rushed at my enemies. When I got in range, I projected broad swathes of ultrasonic cutting force, careful to make sure that I didn't strain my core. The projected blades were wide and lost potency with distance, further research or cultivation advancement might improve the technique.

All the half-orcs and half the vampire's within the rage of my blade were split into severed parts.

The remaining vampires in a display of preternatural speed, dodged the cuts with little or no damage

The demons also dodged but used their magic to create thin shrouds around their bodies to absorb the damage.

These guys were too fast, I might have surprised them with my massive kinetic attack, but now that they were prepared, all I could look forward to if I faced them all at once is a quick death.

Refusing to play their game, I decided to focus on my self assigned mission. Reinforcing my body, I rushed past them to the audience chamber.

Unlike the dream, there was no blockade of massive half-orc bodies standing in my path.

I slowed down to push the massive doors open. I was surprised when I felt the massive doors give way with some effort under my strength. I remember walking in here a little under a month ago and marvelling at the size and weight of these doors. A lot had changed since that terrible day. I cautiously opened the door, scanning the room for any hidden surprises.

Tinuviel sat on the throne, surrounded by more vampires and demons. She seemed unsurprised by my intrusion, like she had been waiting for me. I seethed in rage as the thought that she had already anticipated my next moves occurred to me.

Even sitting, she was still the most powerful being I had ever seen.

At her feet sat the ladies and from the way they stared at me with empty glassy eyes, they must still be under Tinuviel's compulsion.

"William is it? I must admit, you’ve impressed me, your strength and tenacity in the face of overwhelming odds is quite admirable."

"Even your cultivation is a thing of wonder, no matter how hard I look, and I cannot find your core and the weight of your power is closer to mine than it should be even at the core formation stage. How are you able to achieve such a feat?"

I felt the directed force of her demonic gaze, but based on the slightly surprised look on her face, I'm sure she was shocked to see that I returned her stare without flinching, clearly unaffected by her compulsion ability. I could now see where her confidence came from, clearly she was hoping that her mind powers would be the deciding factor in our confrontation.

"Cut the bullshit and the mind fucking games, I'm here for the ladies, hand them over and me and mine we'll be on our fucking way"

I was tired of playing civilized with this degenerate bitch.

"Interesting, your ability to resist mental coercion far surpasses mine, a feat that should be impossible for your race."

I only snorted in response, not interested in exchanging witty banter with this monster.

I simply stretched forth my blade and infused ultrasonic cutting power at its edges, causing a loud hum in the chamber.

"Why do you want to leave, I could give you everything you could ever desire."

"Like sending me home," I said to her, the sarcasm strong in my voice.

She grinned at me, her fanged canines prominent and after a few moments, and then she stood up from her throne.

I positioned myself in a caricature of a fighting stance, clearly anticipating an attack from her.

"You have achieved so much in very little time, with little to no resources, don't you want to save your fellow outrealmer's, and stay and I might let the others go."

I'm sure she expected me to think about it, to consider surrendering so that she might let the others go, “might” being the operative word.

But there were several reasons I'd yet to assign a figure to my intelligence stat, aside from the fact that I had no proper way to measure where my intellect began and the implant's processing capabilities ended.

One of which is because no matter how smart a person is, the human mind is prone to irrational behavior in certain situations. These situations differ from person to person and are structured around our way of thinking. Even when receiving good logical advice not to follow an irrational idea, once the idea is latched onto, most internal logical arguments fall in the face of blatant stupidity.

I was tempted to accept, despite my internal misgivings, my implant’s warnings of micro expressions hinting at deceit or the fact that if I conceded, I would have no way to make her keep her end of the bargain.

Faced with the possibility of saving lives, seemingly high intellect nearly went out the window and I almost nearly did something stupid.

And then, shocking Tinuviel and even myself, I burst out laughing.

My laughter was manic and I shook uncontrollably, tears streaming down my face.

"You want… me to… GIVE MYSELF UP! Just lay back and get shafted on the word of a consummate liar and mind rapist."

Then I looked up at her and said, "You can take your lame ass deal and shove it up your ginormous fucking ass."

Clearly I hit a nerve because her very pale skin tinged with colour. Her size must have been a sore point for her. Just goes to show that no matter how powerful a woman gets, she’s still going to behave like a woman demon or otherwise.

"You really think I'll believe anything that comes from your mouth after all you've done to me, if you expect me to consider any offer coming from those lying lips, then you must be off your meds."

I saw what little color her perfect face had gained by my previous comment, slowly drain away. She looked so angry that her hold on the ladies began to wane.

I could see their eyelids flicker as they slowly regained awareness of their surroundings. Suu made it obvious when she launched herself at Tinuviel, fingers extended like claws.

But dark chains covered in dark smoke burst out from the ground beneath her and wrapped around her body, pulling her to the ground. The chains caused pain on contact causing Suu to cry out in agony.

I wanted to rush to her right there and then, to remove those awful chains covering her beautiful body, again all thoughts of logic almost going out the window.

But I knew that Tinuviel was expecting something like that and so I held my ground.

If there was any chance that all of us would get out of here, I had to stay calm, regardless of the fact that our odds were slim to none. My implant was running my current dilemma through multiple models to find an optimal solution.

"Do you know who I am, WHO YOU'RE SPEAKING TO!!" She screamed in rage

Then she spread out her dark feathery wings and darkness burst out from her slowly shrouding everything in darkness.

I already had my seismic- sense running full tilt so I could still keep track of everybody in the room.

"Humans from the outrealms have no respect, no sense of order, of position, I heard the reports from our scouts sent to your realm."

"Your reliance on tools blinds and diminishes you, you shackle the strong and elevate the weak, and you are blinded by your own sense of false superiority."

"But here, within the boson of Blòtvarda, only the strong thrive, and the weak are their sustenance. Even the elements resonate this truth."

"Know your place vermin or suffer the consequences, if you continue to resist, I will kill this one," she turns and points to the writhing form of Suu wrapped in chains.

The chains tightened on Suu and she began to scream as the pain intensified. The sound tore at my mind and nearly broke my composure. I had to repeatedly remind myself to stay still and keep calm, Suu can handle herself.

Tinuviel stared at me while Suu screamed, hoping to find any cracks in my emotional armor that would give her leverage over me, but just when Suu was about to lose consciousness, she stopped, clearly disappointed at the results of her little experiment.

"You want to kill her, then stop bitchin' and do it, in fact kill the rest of us. You think you have leverage because you can kill us. Your entire spiel about the weak and the strong just shows how little you really know."

"You think you are strong because you are far more powerful than me, but you're wrong."

"With each act of violence, your desperation becomes even more evident."

"You think you have leverage in the form of people I care about, but your word means nothing so you don't have shit."

Tinuviel was getting angrier with the way she placed her fists at her side, she clearly did not like being called a faithless cunt in front of her subordinates.

"You see all this," I pointed around me, "it's built on sand, you coerce those who refuse you and when you come across a situation where your powers of manipulation don't work, you are left at a loss, without even the possibility of diplomacy due to a complete lack of integrity."

"So if you're done making false promises you will not keep and pretending you hold all the cards, I'll say it again let us go or you can do your worst."

"But I promise you this, if I'm going to die here and now, I'm going to take as many of you assholes as I can."

The entire chamber began to shake and I began to channel my geokinetic technique.

The Orcs, demons and vampires looked uncomfortable in the dark as they stared at the ceiling, but I ignored them, my gaze locked on Tinuviel, daring her to make a move.

If she was surprised that I could still sense her even in total darkness, she didn't show it. My sense still gave me an impression of everyone in the room, and I could sense the build up of terror at my declaration

Her plastered smile was no longer on her beautiful face, her eyes looked like chipped violet ice and it looked like she had reached her limit where I was concerned.

I knew this was a battle that I had very little chance of winning, but with the help of my advantages, who could say.

Faster than a blur, she rushed at me, her claws wreathed in black flame.

I had already reinforced my body to my maximum limit and so I raised my blade, anticipating her attack thanks to the stat benefits from my mental firewall.

As she slammed her black claws against my blade, I knew I'd made the wrong call to absorb the attack instead of dodging it.

I was forced to ponder this error in judgment as my feet left the ground and I rocketed across the room.